SUjagTILLiDIE
February 13th, 2010, 11:14 AM
Eddie Robinson Museum fitting tribute
Grambling coach stands among civil rights greats who made difference with sports
By Richard Lapchick
Special to ESPN.com
Archive
It could not be more appropriate that the Eddie Robinson Museum opens in Grambling, La., right in the middle of Black History Month 2010.
http://a.espncdn.com/photo/2010/0211/pg2_u_robinsone_200.jpg
"Leadership, like coaching, is fighting for the hearts and souls of men and getting them to believe in you," coach Eddie Robinson said.
The grand opening on Saturday will be preceded by a huge banquet in Coach Robinson's honor Friday night with keynote speaker Mike Tomlin, who knows he wouldn't have been coach of the 2009 Super Bowl champion Pittsburgh Steelers without Robinson.
It has been almost three years since Robinson died in April 2007. He led a life so extraordinary that it was worthy of a museum. When I think of iconic African-American sports figures who changed America, I think of Jackie Robinson, Muhammad Ali, Arthur Ashe and Eddie Robinson.
The Muhammad Ali Center in Louisville, Ky., opened in 2005. Rachel Robinson, the amazing wife of Jackie Robinson, continues the final stages of fundraising to open the Jackie Robinson Museum in New York. And someday, I assume, there will be more than the Arthur Ashe statue in Richmond, Va. But this is Eddie Robinson's time.
His achievements were unparalleled. When he retired, he had more wins than any coach in the history of Division I football, had sent more of his players to the NFL than any other coach, had a team graduation rate of nearly 80 percent in a sport in which it hovered around 50 percent nationally, and never had a player get in trouble with the law until his last and 57th year as head coach of Grambling.
http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/commentary/news/story?id=4908131
Grambling coach stands among civil rights greats who made difference with sports
By Richard Lapchick
Special to ESPN.com
Archive
It could not be more appropriate that the Eddie Robinson Museum opens in Grambling, La., right in the middle of Black History Month 2010.
http://a.espncdn.com/photo/2010/0211/pg2_u_robinsone_200.jpg
"Leadership, like coaching, is fighting for the hearts and souls of men and getting them to believe in you," coach Eddie Robinson said.
The grand opening on Saturday will be preceded by a huge banquet in Coach Robinson's honor Friday night with keynote speaker Mike Tomlin, who knows he wouldn't have been coach of the 2009 Super Bowl champion Pittsburgh Steelers without Robinson.
It has been almost three years since Robinson died in April 2007. He led a life so extraordinary that it was worthy of a museum. When I think of iconic African-American sports figures who changed America, I think of Jackie Robinson, Muhammad Ali, Arthur Ashe and Eddie Robinson.
The Muhammad Ali Center in Louisville, Ky., opened in 2005. Rachel Robinson, the amazing wife of Jackie Robinson, continues the final stages of fundraising to open the Jackie Robinson Museum in New York. And someday, I assume, there will be more than the Arthur Ashe statue in Richmond, Va. But this is Eddie Robinson's time.
His achievements were unparalleled. When he retired, he had more wins than any coach in the history of Division I football, had sent more of his players to the NFL than any other coach, had a team graduation rate of nearly 80 percent in a sport in which it hovered around 50 percent nationally, and never had a player get in trouble with the law until his last and 57th year as head coach of Grambling.
http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/commentary/news/story?id=4908131